Co-Lin Natchez newspaper brings home 12 state awards

By Special to The Democrat | The Natchez Democrat

Published Saturday, August 16, 2008

Natchez — “N-Sights,” the campus newspaper at Copiah-Lincoln Community College in Natchez, recently won 12 awards in state competition, including four first place honors.

The competition was sponsored by the Mississippi Press Association and located at the Eagle Ridge Conference Center at Hinds Community College in Raymond.

“We are fortunate to have such a dedicated group of students, year after year, who work tirelessly to produce an award winning newspaper,” said Teresa Harrison, vice president of the Natchez campus. “Their motivation is not to win awards, but to keep our students, faculty, staff and community informed about Co-Lin. Mr. Mark LaFrancis, N-Sights advisor, challenges our newspaper staff to produce quality work that is informative and entertaining.”

LaFrancis said the student staff works hard.

“I am indeed proud of the staff members; it takes a lot of work to put out a campus newspaper, let alone an award-winning newspaper,” LaFrancis said.

“The judges praised several of our entries, and liked the magazine style presentation of the newspaper,” LaFrancis said.

Awards included:

General excellence: second place — staff

Feature story: first — Chiquita Williams (story about Melanie Nowlin volunteering at the Humane Society)

General interest column: third — Christine Brinegar

Spot news photograph: first and second — Scott Crane for photos taken at 2007 Spring Fling

Feature photograph: first and honorable mention — Scott Crane (first) for the Co-Lin sign and Mark M. LaFrancis (honorable mention) for a portrait photo of Linda Harper with a dog at the Humane Society.

Investigative package or news package: third — for the staff-produce package about the campus wellness initiative.

Front page: third — staff

Layout and design: second — staff

Graphic: first and second — staff

The campus newspaper is published six times during the school year with stories, art and photographs produced chiefly with student staff members.